Comrade Meir Vilner

On June 7, on behalf of the Central Committee of the CPI(M), its Polit Bureau member Sitaram Yechury sent the following message to the leaders and cadres of the Communist Party of Israel, condoling the death of veteran Israeli communist leader, Comrade Meir Vilner, on June 5.

THE Central Committee of Communist Party of India (Marxist) conveys its profound condolences at the sad demise of Comrade Meir Vilner. His death has unfortunately come at a very critical moment in the history of the Palestine-Israel conflict.

Comrade Vilner was a staunch communist who upheld Marxism-Leninism even in the most difficult of times. His firm belief that socialism alone could be the future of humanity will continue to be a source of inspiration to communists the world over.

Please convey our sincere condolences to his family. We are confident that the Communist Party of Israel will carry forward his legacy.

BRIEF LIFE SKETCH

ON June 5, Comrade Meir Vilner passed away in Tel-Aviv, at the age of 84. He had been the leader of the Communist Party of Israel for many years, and later also of Hadash (Democratic Front for Peace and Equality). For about forty years he was a member of the Knesset (Israeli parliament), and was the last living signatory of the Israeli declaration of independence.

Meir Vilner was born in 1918 in Vilnius, then in Poland and now the capital of Lithuania. He graduated from the Hebrew high school “Tarbut” and was in his youth, a member of the “Hashomer Hatzair” youth movement. In 1938 he came to then mandated Palestine in order to study at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 1940 he joined the Communist Party, then maintaining an underground existence. He was member of Mo’etzet Ha’am, the semi-parliamentary institute of the Jewish community under British rule, and later of the interim state council established with the creation of Israel. For many years he was a member of the Communist Party’s leadership, serving as secretary-general from 1965 to 1990 and as chairperson from 1990 to 1993.  

Meir Vilner considered as the biggest goal for himself and his comrades the creation and maintenance of a unique political body and social milieu where, in spite of a complicated and difficult situation, Jews and Arabs could live together in equality and amity, and run a common struggle for a just peace, for equality of the Arab population and for defence of workers’ rights.

Vilner persistently held to the Marxist-Leninist ideology and believed that, despite all the upheavals which the world has seen in the past years, socialism will finally prove to be the future of humanity. He steadfastly expressed his principled ideological and political convictions, even when they were unacceptable to many and when voicing them was far from easy. He always struggled for the values he considered healthy, in the true interest of both peoples of the land --- the Jews and the Arabs.

In 1967, Meir Vilner was stabbed and wounded during an assassination attempt by a member of the right-wing Herut Party. At the time, Vilner personally and his party were the target of an incitement campaign on a scale which is nearly inconceivable nowadays. That was due to his stand of completely opposing the occupation and calling for its termination, steadfastly opposing war and advocating the recognition of the Arab Palestinian people’s right to establish an independent state side-by-side with Israel.

Comrade Meir Vilner had been hospitalised in the last four months of his life.